Crysanthemums and Ashes
by Akaitsuru
Summary: Since "A Very Long Night," something subtle has been building between Amidamaru and Yoh. A mysterious book in Anna's possession, however, brings secrets boiling to the surface in ways no one would have wished...
1. Reincarnation 10 2: Haunting Weather

Author's notes: Seriously, Yoh, the things that happen when you're sleep... Apologies for the repeated theme, but this is actually a reworked "good bit" from a previous draft of Burnt. I decided to turn it into insight on Amidamaru's "illness." Be aware it gets a little graphic - but not as graphic as it could be. If you want, check out the UNCENSORED ADULT VERSION at http: // anime. adultfanfiction. net/ story. php? no=600049254 (take out the spaces in the address there. Search "Akaitsuru RedCrane" on adultfanfiction. net if you need to get there manually.) I'd appreciate it if you'd leave comments and reviews here at , though!

Additionally, sorry for any manga timeline continuity errors. I had to change the "Burnt" story to be a bit after this, in order to make everything fit in properly between Chapters 10 and 11.

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Reincarnation 10.2: Haunting Weather

By Akaitsuru RedCrane

It was an early summer storm of rare power. Rain raked over Funbari, long silver sheets of water shearing at the foliage that had begun to emerge from the cherry trees. It hammered hard against blue-tiled roofs, cascaded down drainpipes and flooded into the streets. Streams burgeoned in the canals, their rushing white noise adding to the din of thunder; lightning provided the only light visible in the suburb, bolts darting to paint the edges of everything in brilliant white. The electricity was out, and the night was darkly overcast, starless.

The Inn of Flames was illuminated by tattered lanterns rescued from storage, which gave its antique wood and soft tatami floors a decrepit air. The candles within the paper lamps flickered at every gust of wind, touched by the drafts of the historic building. Despite the flames' faint efforts, the shadows were terrifyingly deep in places, and every once in a while there was a hint of strange, shuddering movement that shouldn't have been visible in the gloom... maybe even a half-imagined glimpse of evil eyes, glaring down between the ceiling rafters. A faint creaking sound resounded through empty hallways, like slow footsteps, or labored moans coming up from underneath the floor...

Yoh Asakura yawned and rolled over, the candle flames reflected in his eyes as he struggled to stay awake. Even with the rain outside, his den was pleasantly warm, almost stuffy; he was lounging on the tatami floor, wearing nothing but a hotel robe and a bandage around his shoulder. The disturbing noises in the corridor grew, scraping and groaning gradually beginning to eclipse the rumbles of thunder outside, but Yoh didn't seem to notice. He smiled, lashes fluttering closed, oblivious to the dark, mumbling shapes slithering around the corners of his living room.

Just as a shadow that looked suspiciously like a claw-tipped hand started to creep across the rush matting toward the boy, a sliver of brightness flashed down and casually skewered it. The malevolent fingers evaporated instantly, curling away like dust around the point of the sword; the walls' creaking shrieks faded as a broad-shouldered figure stepped out of nowhere, coming to kneel by the teenager's side. The glow surrounding this shape chased away darkness, dispelling it as simply and easily as the moon gliding from behind a cloud.

((Yoh-dono? Do you not think it is time for bed?))

"Hm?" The shaman did not move, rumpled gown twisted around him. There was a manga propped open on his chest. "Mm... reading my book..."

((But will not Lady Anna's training on the morrow...))

"She promised to let me off the hook in the morning, since my shoulder wasn't looking so great today." Finally sitting up a little, Yoh managed a tousled, hazy grin upwards. "Here, calm down and come read 'Hakaba Kitaro' with me, Amidamaru."

The glowing figure's sharp, thin face softened for a moment, fierce eyes going completely, achingly gentle. He sat down and folded his legs underneath him, spine stiff in rigid formal posture. His gaze watched Yoh as though seeking for his approval. The boy chuckled, flopping back down and repositioning himself with his head on his companion's knees. When the teenager settled, the pale silhouette relaxed and sighed a little, a gesture that implied practice rather than actual breath: even after six hundred years as a spirit, the habits of the flesh died hard.

On the pages of Yoh's book, yuurei - illustrated yuurei - wheeled and chased one another. Amidamaru tried to enjoy the adventures of the monster child so neatly detailed across the panels (in the feudal warrior's opinion, manga was one of the greatest inventions of the last six centuries) but despite his master's best efforts the comic kept drooping lower and lower. By the time the volume slipped out of the boy's hands, a soft snore could be heard mixing with the patter of rain outside.

Distraction of puzzling out modern Japanese gone, the ghost shifted, abruptly and excruciatingly aware of how the shaman fit against his legs. The soft weight of Yoh's head pillowed on his thighs was bad enough, but from this vantage point, the rumpled condition of the boy's yukata exposed a long V of skin almost all the way down to his hip. The edges of the teenager's collarbone, the white-wrapped arc of his ribs, even the subtle pulse beating in his neck were thrown into alluring relief by lantern light. Amidamaru sensed buried thoughts struggling to unearth themselves and chastised himself quietly: he had known it was a poor idea to sit so close in the first place, but Yoh's friendly invitation had simply been too much to refuse...

The wind keened around the eaves and set the lantern fires to wilder dancing. Golden shadows played over the shaman's face in fleeting patterns. Amidamaru stared at the scene for what felt like a long time, almost appearing to gather his strength. Finally, with extreme delicacy, he slipped his hands beneath Yoh's shoulders, meaning to lift the boy and make his silent escape. The young warrior's ghostly fingers, however, apparently misjudged their aim. Instead of coming to rest as intended, they shifted right through the cotton and slid down the boy's smooth back - for all the world like a longed-for caress.

Amidamaru flinched, the sensation of contact with downy skin as shocking as grabbing a hot stove would be for a living person. Ghosts existed on a plane which overlapped with the physical universe only at key points, like the body of a shaman: the shade knew all too well that reconnecting to physical reality was an experience so stimulating for a spirit, it could border on the dangerously intoxicating. Death's loneliness was a terrible burden for even the most sanctified of souls, and certainly the samurai's spirit was not immune to its effects. Loyalty, virtue, detachment - he might have meditated on these things at great length since his final battle, but in the end his heart was still weak and human.

*Six centuries of isolation, up on that hill,* Amidamaru remembered, that weary eternity like a crushing weight in his memories. *Six _centuries_ waiting for the one I loved, who never came...*

The guardian's poorly buried thoughts clawed closer to the surface when he glanced down at the boy who had appeared in his friend's stead. Even now, he was waiting, it seemed. Waiting, unsure if the person he was waiting for had already forgotten him.

((My lord...))

The ghost's soft words were almost a plea, a feeble wish for Yoh to wake. But although the teenager's lashes fluttered, he did not stir, and the spirit did not attempt to speak again. The tips of his fingers were still touching the boy: Amidamaru's hands seemed to resonate at every point of contact, burning and freezing by turns. Slowly, so slowly he managed to start pulling them back... until at the last moment, his palm brushed the sensitive curve of Yoh's neck, and made his master let out a tiny, sleepy noise of pleasure.

"...Ahn..."

A forked lash of lighting whipped down and struck somewhere nearby, bathing everything in eerie brilliance. The flare shone straight through Amidamaru's ghostly silhouette - blinding, seeming to erase his already tenuous presence from existence for the space of a heartbeat. The hollow crack of thunder that followed made Yoh twitch; the ghost's resolutions crumbled, and he cupped the back of the shaman's head again, smoothing the silky hair there until his master quieted.

*I just... cannot bear this, Yoh-dono.* Amidamaru's soul writhed in a sort of agony, finally forced to acknowledge those thoughts he longed to keep suppressed. The dimming shine of his outline rippled like a fire without enough air. *Ever since I learned the touch of your lips, I simply... cannot... bear this...*

The ghost's eyes darted unconsciously in the direction of Anna's room before returning to his master's face. Something benighted twisted in the center of Amidamaru's being, the terrible, subtle ache of guilty anticipation starting to throb in his chest. Before he could allow himself to hesitate, Amidamaru leaned low over his master's slender form, listening to the sound of Yoh's breathing against the roar of storm outside. Their foreheads brushed and then touched, Amidamaru's face nestled into the tangle of Yoh's hair.

((I am... sorry,)) the guardian whispered. ((I know. That night, I swore it would be the last time. But I am going to do it again after all...))

The candles lighting the scene fizzled sharply, writhing in strangely burnt colors. The house groaned again in a distressingly heartfelt keen. And then the flames went out all at once, as though extinguished by an unseen hand.

"You all know what to do, don'cha?"

A crowd of small faces nodded, beaming with eagerness even under their habitual coats of dirt and bruises.

"You're gonna be quick and quiet and pay attention, enjoyin' the fair but keeping your eyes open for danger, aren'tcha?"

Solemn grins at this, a touch of obvious fear mixed with barely contained excitement.

"You all know what to say if you get caught, don'tcha?"

Back to the nods, even more vigorous this time, impatient.

"'Oh please mista, please, I waz only playin,'" one little girl piped up by way of demonstration, her face scrunching up in a very convincing parody of tears. "That's wut we says, isn't it?"

"Very good." A hand reached out and patted her dusty head. "Last question, everyone! What do you ya do if all else fails?"

"Run! Start yellin! Start yellin for Amidamaru!"

The tribe of orphans screeched their habitual backup plan in joyful unison and then scattered like sparrows, too eager to wait through any more cautions. Mosuke straightened up from where he had been crouched in the mob's midst, a smile playing about his own face as they took off in all directions. The blacksmith's son, sinewy and muscular despite years of rough living and poor food, turned to the only other figure left by the roadside and nodded. His companion was much taller, seemingly older than himself, but the youth did not appear aware of this at all - he came over and grabbed Amidamaru's hand as though it belonged to him, tugging him eagerly towards the lights and music the other children had disappeared into.

"C'mon, the others are going to get all the loot if we don't hurry!"

Amidamaru started to follow but then hesitated, a secret, sad gaze falling on the back of his friend's head. Mosuke stopped pulling his arm and glanced behind, still grinning, an impish look in his eyes. Bringing his partner's hand to his mouth he kissed it, sweetly, but with a hint of mild mockery too. The blacksmith's lips were warm and solid, the feeling as true as if neither of them had ever died: it made Amidamaru shudder, skin tingling with the return of long-lost sensitivity.

"Don't go all noble on me now, you know I won't make you steal anything yourself." Yanking on Amidamaru's wrist Mosuke pulled him close, reaching up to smooth the pale hair. His face turned serious, teenaged features taking on a look that would evolve into a truly smoldering stare when he was a bit older. "Don't worry. Everyone else will be dead asleep tonight, ya know. We'll finally have the chance to do something... nice..."

*No. We will not. This is only a dream, a memory.*

Terrible nostalgia pierced Amidamaru's heart, looking at his first love's sincerity through adult eyes. He responded as he would have in the past, though, and dipped his head shyly - Mosuke chuckled and kissed his forehead, turning again to the festival that had brought them here. Taiko were beginning to play, resounding drums ringing out from somewhere unseen. More people were arriving, walking down the path in front the pair; the strangers were blurry illusions, shadows half-recalled from years of visiting this fair as a child.

*If I wished to, perhaps I could live it all over again.* Amidamaru lifted his gaze to the shrine's red torii gate, followed its sweeping curve as though searching for an answer hanging there. *Perhaps I could go down this road a mile or two and I would come to our temple, with the pans on the floor to catch the rain leaks and the blankets we shared before the Buddha's blessed statue.* They were walking now, the former samurai's hand firmly held in Mosuke's. *...But that is not why I came. This past of mine is an illusionary shroud, draped across power that does not belong to me. There is only one thing here that is real...*

He had to remind himself of that over and over again when the remembrance of Mosuke's fingers twined around his felt so solid. Seeing this ancient reflection of his friend made his heart even heavier than it already felt... but he had long since come to terms with the fact that their relationship belonged to a life six hundred years dead and gone. Even Mosuke - the real Mosuke, his spirit - had agreed the last time their ghosts had spoken, usual rough-edged realism hiding his regret.

*((I see how you watch that kid. I used to watch you that way.))*

The adolescent vision of his friend paused, skillfully prying a wallet loose from some distracted matsuri patron. All around them, Amidamaru knew the other orphans were doing the same - back then, this autumn gathering had provided their livelihood for most of winter. At the end of the night, Amidamaru and Mosuke had always counted everything up and gleefully made plans about what groceries they would buy until their garden started to grow again in the spring. Small wonder that this important event always wound up as the staging point for the swordsman's dream-walkings...

Mosuke danced back from the man in the ski jacket whose pocket he had been picking. Some of the crowd were now obviously wearing modern garb instead of Muromachi dress, and Amidamaru realized that this was a point where he could move closer to his goal. When Mosuke turned away, searching for another target, Amidamaru took a deep breath and stepped sideways into the press of people. It broke him a little every time he did this, sharp shards of grief grinding together under his ribcage, but once his former lover was out of sight the tightness in his throat began to ease. A little.

He quickly began to walk toward the main hall of the shrine. The vendor booths passed by in a blur, a strange mixture of new and old technology on display: the candy seller's pavilion and the taiyaki man's griddle were powered with electricity, but directly between them a girl grilled sparrows over hot coals, her motions lit by torches. The shrine's Noh stage, roof hung with hundreds of paper lanterns, loomed large in Amidamaru's vision. This structure was sharply defined, radiant against the backdrop of the setting sun, and he made it his goal.

The taikos' booming voices continued to sing out, but he was leaving the crowd in his wake and advancing alone. He noticed that the air around him was growing colder... colder... and colder, colder still, the chill increasing with every step he took toward the peaked roof of the main shrine. A few lengths from the edge of the stage and it was already far too frigid for mid-October, the harvest days of the festival from his own memory. Something crackled under his feet, and when he looked down he saw it was ice: a thin layer of snow that rapidly deepened and stretched out beyond where he stood.

The white blanket coated the trees rising around the shrine's main building, too. It was a forest of titanic pines, completely different from the maples he'd left only a few strides behind him. The land just ahead was far wilder and steeper than the open fields from Amidamaru's childhood; it was as though with the act of crossing the square, he had instead crossed the entire country and was now standing at the edge of the frigid North. The samurai was walking into the heart of someone else's winter night, even with the autumn sun of his own village shining cheerfully on his back.

*He is very close, today.* Another disconcerting flutter of anticipation, and the familiar gnawing of remorse sharpened. The spirit knew he was about to leave his own dream behind now. *...This is my last chance to stop this...*

The wind gusted, unfurling in his face, bringing with it faint smells that were sharp to his reincarnated senses: damp tatami, fresh mud, and lightning. An image crossed his mind, of candle flames and shadows flickering on young skin. Amidamaru realized he was moving again, pushing forward. The winter closed around him completely, like a fist, and he was sure if he glanced over his shoulder now there would be nothing he recognized - no trace of his own simple past, besides the taiko continuing to throb. Only a mountain trail and more of the primeval trees, gathering in clots of evening darkness with their tangled branches. Realizing this, he tried his best not to look back.

The notes of a shakuhachi flute shimmered into hearing, dipping low and then flying upward into a scintillating trill. Amidamaru stopped, looked up, already anticipating what he would see. From behind the bobbing lanterns adorning the stage emerged a silhouette, shining in pure white robes, more luminous than even the huge electric floodlights spilling glare at his feet. The figure's only ornament was a golden hairpin wrought in the shape of a chrysanthemum, gleaming where it nestled in untamable brown hair. Even Yoh's skin seemed to be glowing, as he raised his arms and began to dance.

The paces were slow and stately at first, regimented in perfect time to the slow beat of the music and the faintest suggestion of chimes. The grave, ancient music appeared to control that lithe body, so flawless was the synchronization between rhythm and stance. The boy glided across the ringing platform in measured steps, long sleeves billowing; smooth sweeps of his hands and flicks of the wrist made the hanging fabric bell further, first shrouding, then revealing his form with artful delicacy.

Little by little, anarchy infiltrated the pattern Yoh walked, enlivening it, loosening it. The folds of his costume began to waft around him like mist, whirling and rising as though he were being romanced by a solemn breeze. When the flute's tempo began to pick up speed, the dancer followed suit, bending and twisting wildly - the last traces of stiffness and rigidity gone, transparent silk fluttering around his limbs, the shaman's figure seemed about to transcend his human flesh and become something else entirely.

*If I were still one of them, I know I would see all the spirits of this mountain gathered around him now, enraptured.* A kind of transcendent sorrow wrung Amidamaru as he watched. *Perhaps... being a ghost is...*

Yoh twirled one last time, rising up on his toes and then actually leaping to levitate a few inches above the makeshift stage. The ceremonial song came to a sharp peak, woodwind melody shrieking and then tattering away to nothing with the invisible player's fading breath. The stage lanterns ignited with the of dull green of foxfire, sparks snapping off and shattering into thousands of tiny hitodama - the floodlights burst in gouts of glittering glass. Amidamaru realized his shaman was staring at him with wide, transfixed eyes: their gazes locked together, drawing the warrior in. Like lighting, being called to earth.

Yoh wavered and finally fell, the magic suspending him dissipating into the alpine air. With the strange ease of dreams Amidamaru found himself at his master's side, holding the boy's hands, bowing before him where he had partially collapsed on the stage. A few stray spirit flares drifted around their legs, strobing dully, casting firefly shadows on both pale faces.

"Let's get away from here," Yoh whispered. Minute red stains were beginning to smudge the white of his robes, flowering from a scattering of glass cuts on his arms and legs. Amidamaru gasped faintly at this but the shaman only smiled, reaching to be picked up by his guardian - walking was out of the question in his bare feet. A damp feeling slid across the samurai's face as Yoh wrapped his arms around Amidamaru's neck: a smear of the shaman's blood, marking his cheek. The thought threatened to make guardian stumble as he picked his way to the stairs leading down from the stage.

"Are you cold, my lord?"

The sound of his own voice, not a ghostly echo but true words bred of air and flesh, was almost as thrilling for Amidamaru as Yoh's tantalizing proximity to him. They were sitting on a mound of pine needles, beneath a sheltering group of trees some distance from the honden. The samurai had followed a little path into the forest by instinct and it had lead them here: a tranquil grove, almost free of ice, heavy evergreen boughs mostly hiding the stone altar of a tiny Inari shrine.

Despite the forgotten air of the place, some devoted follower of the rice kami had still lit a pair of small torches near this set of torii gates. They gave just enough light to see by - and added supernatural life to the faces of the fox sculptures holding vigil for their god. Amidamaru looked at the statues as he asked his master the question, and did not flinch when he thought he saw the vulpine faces grin back at him. Although this quiet intimacy with his partner was ultimately what he had sought, he had become too nervous to even glance at the boy by his side.

"I'm fine. I don't feel it at all any more, actually. That's kind of odd, isn't it." There was a rustle as Yoh moved. "Look, the snow doesn't even melt when I hold it. How funny!"

The young guardian couldn't avoid turning to glance as requested. Yoh was on his knees, holding a handful of powdery crystals in his cupped palms. Bending close to try and decipher the mystery, he looked like a curious child caught in a moment of simplicity. The glimmer of the chrysanthemum pin above his ear shot splinters of reflected gold off into the trees. Despite an aching moment of self-reproach, Amidamaru found he could not turn his eyes back to the empty dusk, and subtly shifted to face his shaman.

*I should not have come this far if I did not intend to go through with this.*

"Perhaps it is the power of your rite, still acting upon you," the swordsman demurred, trying to give a logical answer to Yoh's inquisitiveness. It often happened that the teenager woke himself up by realizing the strangeness of what he was dreaming - out of all the outcomes Amidamaru had charted in this world, that was the one that happened the most, and it was the hardest to avoid.

"It could be. I haven't danced the Asakuras' kagura for a long time, not since I was little." There was a wistful note in Yoh's voice that quickly turned to relief as he dusted the snow away and sat back again. Stretching, he grinned up at the warrior with his back against a tree trunk. "It feels good to relax after all that! I kinda forgot how intense it can get."

"I did not even know you could dance that way, for my part." Through his boiling emotions, a sudden smile broke through and etched itself on Amidamaru's lean face: if nothing else, he would be able to hold the image of Yoh dancing in his heart forever. "It was... most impressive, my lord."

"Thanks. My mother taught me. She said maybe some day I could catch myself a guardian spirit with its summoning power." The young shaman chuckled, but his eyes were suddenly quizzical, as though something intriguing had just occurred to him. He glanced up and their gazes fused again, drawn together just as they had for that instant during the dance. "I thought she was trying to make a joke or something. It never worked... until tonight."

The ghost put one hand on the bark beside Yoh's head and leaned in, slowly. The boy did not move, but there was no sign of rejection in his stare: only a hint of questioning, a vacillation between hesitation and hope. It was so obvious and sweet that most of the spirit's reservations were abruptly submerged by a flood of tenderness. He bridged the final space between them and brought their lips together in a rush, gently pinning his master to the tree. A soft noise escaped Yoh's throat, but he reached up to bring the guardian closer. Slender hands clasped Amidamaru's forearms and tugged him near enough that their knees brushed, that their body heat mingled. Their flickering shadows eclipsed one another.

*He is so lovely.* The kind of uncontainable emotion that would have made him burst forth with radiance as a ghost now simply expressed itself as a sweet, physical ache. *So... innocent... even after everything we have shared in this place... each motion, each reaction is like the first, over and over again. I truly believe he remembers none of it, not even as a nightmare.*

That sudden thought - the unendurable bitterness of being forgotten, forsaken every morning when his love awoke - manifested itself in the dream as a blast of piercing wind knifing through the pines. True winter closed in with it, reemerging as frigid as his regret; the samurai's chest was pierced by frost, the sensation of ice encroaching on his heart. It froze down to the bone, a deadening sensation, a little bit of dread that wouldn't go away...

But a charming flush was beginning to rise in Yoh's cheeks as their lips continued to brush against one another. Amidamaru brought a palm to his partner's face, felt the boy's heat suffuse itself through him and drive back sorrow. Even if this joy was fleeting and ultimately useless, all he could focus on right now was how Yoh's breath rippled across his new skin when they were this close. The cold receded as quickly as it had come, the dream's strange equilibrium restored with the warrior's passion. Amidamaru softly traced his tongue across the seam of Yoh's lips, a silent request, and the shaman acquiesced after only a moment... this time it was Amidamaru's turn to sigh, as the blissful sweetness of his master's mouth opened under his.

Out in the blackness beyond their circle of light, there was no sound. The universe had narrowed to the two of them: even the shrine and the trees were growing indistinct, like smears of colored ink in the background of a brush painting. Amidamaru outlined the fine curve of Yoh's ear as they continued to kiss, smoothing strands of silken brown back from where they had escaped the gilded hairpin. His hand slid, savoring every movement of muscle, every taunt line of the boy's neck until it vanished under the fabric of his costume's collar.

Yoh paused, feeling him there, and then very cautiously shrugged the garment a bit looser. Amidamaru exposed the shaman's shoulders with something approaching reverence, treating even the bloodstained robe as if it were delicate rice paper. The bow of the shaman boy's clavicle was a exquisite invitation, emerging from the silk exactly as Amidamaru remembered it from their living room: the samurai shifted his attentions to that vulnerable line, touching Yoh's nape to urge him to lean into the caresses. Yoh did so, just as he had in the waking world, eyes half-lidded when he rested his chin on Amidamaru's shoulder. A shiver passed through them both as the guardian's tongue pressed against the downy hollow at the base of his charge's throat and began to lick.

"H-Hey, Amidamaru - " Yoh laid a hand on his warrior's wrist when he started to pull the boy's kimono lower again.

"Please..." The words were shamefully hoarse in Amidamaru's throat, pleading and raw with emotion he could no longer hold in check. "Please let me, my lord... I came all this way to be with you..."

"It's alright." The shaman was blushing intensely - but he actually reached out and raised Amidamaru's chin to look him in the eye. "It's just... can't you take your clothes off too? I want to see you... the way you see me..."

The ghost fit both hands beneath Yoh and lifted him out from under the tree. They embraced for a long fragile moment: Yoh perched in the curve of his warrior's arm, the guardian hugging him tightly as he stared off into the dark sky above the tiny clearing. A few flakes of new snow began to feather down around them, quickly joined by others - they started to catch in Yoh's hair, still unmelting, shaken away as easily as flower petals.

Setting the boy on his feet, the samurai stood before the torii gate of the shrine and went to work releasing his armored cloak's knotted bindings. The lacquer plates on his limbs he also cast aside, letting them fall to the ground one by one. Then there was only the ragged-sleeved cotton of his own kosode left: a tattered black inversion of Yoh's gossamer white robe. The ribbon of his obi came apart at a touch, and then the snow was falling on his bare skin.

"You have scars!" Yoh exclaimed, looking at him with astonished and then embarrassed eyes, as though he hadn't meant to utter this revelation aloud.

"Of course I do, my lord. I can only feel fortunate to say that my swordsmanship improved with every one of them." Amidamaru turned his head, glanced at a twisted mark that ran jaggedly down to his elbow. "Except perhaps this one here. I fell out of a tree once when I was twelve."

*That was the first time Mosuke kissed me, trying to sew that up.*

"Haha. Well, I don't like the idea of 'no pain no gain' but I guess it's true. Especially for samurai, but shamans too probably." The boy's eternal spark of good humor once again submerged under apprehension as he took a step forward, stared searchingly up at his partner. "Can I...?"

"As you wish."

A faint sense of contact on one of the healed blade wounds near his stomach set every nerve in the spirit's body tingling ecstatically. Then he felt another, and another... in the back of his mind the desire was building to torment, but Amidamaru somehow managed to stand perfectly still and let his master proceed at his own pace. Yoh's explorations gradually became bolder, unhesitatingly moving up and down the pale-haired young man's frame, until at last it seemed that he had traced every visible mar.

"They're different from mine," came an introspective murmur. The shaman was looking at his own arm, focused not on the recently scabbed-over scratches but at the harsher, more permanent marks beneath. "Mine are almost... sunken into me, you know? Like angry ghosts carve away a piece of me when they lash out..."

"Yours are beautiful, though, Yoh-dono!"

Fingers yet poised over his protector, the shaman shot him a painfully doubtful look, as though unable to trust in the sincerity of what he'd just heard. The samurai's feelings welled in response, brimming with everything he had always longed to admit - he knelt down and took Yoh's hands, warming them with his the way he'd never been able to do in the waking world.

"Please, listen, my lord. Every one of your scars is a emblem of courage and honor. Only a person of great kindness would reach out to the restless dead, let alone bleed for the shades of strangers. In the short time we have been together, I have seen you do both many times." Something caught in the warrior's throat, a little needle of pure pride to serve such a master. "That is why you command not only my loyalty... but my love... my unworthy soul, in all its entirety."

Those perfect soft lips parted for him again, and did not pull away even when he undid the last ties keeping Yoh's wrap draped around his waist.

They lay together in the snow afterwards. The shaman's skinny frame was pressed against the warrior's, his face concealed beneath Amidamaru's chin; both had their eyes closed while they curled tightly around each other, like the last two beings at the end of the world. The sky's descending flakes were large and fluffy and soft as feathers now, and they piled into drifts around the boy, almost as if seeking to shelter him - Amidamaru's hands, too, found themselves cradling the small of his partner's back, stroking him lightly but repetitively in a muted motion of anxiety.

*I... I have... and it felt so, so good, but... oh, but even now, I _still_ cannot bear to let him go... Not now... not ever... NEVER...*

The boy was so utterly motionless that he might have been sleeping. The samurai knew better. Falling asleep in this world meant waking in the real one... and, every once in a while, Amidamaru could hear his master making the faintest of shallow whimpers muffled against his chest. Those tiny noises, Yoh reacting minutely when his body hurt him too much to keep silent, shot to the very core of the guardian's shame. Even though he had heard them so many times now... even though this was how they always finished, clinging to each other with happiness and despair too mingled to tell the conflicting emotions apart...

*Each time I hear these sounds, I vow on my heart that I will NEVER trespass in his dreams ever again.* The ghost's ribcage felt tight, like something inside was struggling to get out - or to get in. *...How many times more can I swear that false oath, I wonder... How many more times can I go through this fantasy, before I truly begin to wish that we would NEVER wake from it...?*

One of the half-voiced sobs against his chest turned into a gasp, a spasm running up Yoh's spine when he tried to raise his head.

"Amidamaru...?"

"Y-Yes, my lord?"

"You're... holding me kind of tight..." The boy laughed a little: with the exhaustion in his voice the ghost could not tell if it was true amusement, or something else entirely. "Hey. I... I have something I want to ask you, but I'm afraid it's kinda selfish of me..."

The warrior felt the burn of shocked tears start beneath his lids. *I have done this to him, and he is the one who feels selfish. Oh, my love...* "Anything. Anything for you. Only tell me, Yoh-dono."

"I think things are going to get rough for us soon. Maybe really bad. This Shaman Fight thing, Anna... even worse than those. But please... no matter what happens..." and here Yoh paused, waited for the warrior to open his eyes and look at him. "Don't leave me... I'll need your help... so don't leave me, like my last guardian did..."

The immediate, reactionary denial struggled to get out, but those comforting words choked and died in Amidamaru's throat before he could utter them. All he could do was stare at his master, stare past him at the newly barren landscape that rose and fell in all directions around where they were stretched. Instead of snow, that white sign of purity that had surrounded them all this time, there was something thick and gray shrouding the ground now: ashes. Deep, deep mounds of ashes, piling up as quickly as they could fall through the night. And they were cold, blindingly cold, as cold as the snow should have been from the very beginning.

"You won't, will you?"

Yoh's voice was thin, imploring, even though he was still trying to smile. His entire body was smeared with darkness, the gray clinging to his face and dirtying it pitifully. The stray spark of gold that had once been his chrysanthemum hairpin was disappearing in the thickening blizzard, covered over where it had fallen, lost without a sound - Amidamaru raised his arms, pulled Yoh to him again, unable to protect him from the horrifying sight but trying just the same.

"Never... Not even if you ordered me to... I would... never... NEVER..."

But the vision of those gray, gray ashes, falling inexorably to smother out the end of the dream, seemed to insist otherwise.

* * *

Author's notes: Hmm, did not expect the Matamune reference there at the end, but it kinda just appeared. This whole story's theoretical operation is based on an idea I had about Hyoui Gattai, btw. Spirit possession - combining two souls in one body - that occurs while asleep apparently has some very sexy lucid dreaming results.

THERE IS AN UNCENSORED VERSION which is available at http: // anime. adultfanfiction. net/ story. php? no=600049254. It leaves in all the (kind of gratuitous) graphic detail in the middle of the story, along with a little more (accidental) plot; hopefully some of you might like it, so please have a look.

Yoh's dreamscape is a hazy memory or echo of Mt. Osore. Also, the description of his dance is largely what the Shinto religious ritual called 'kagura' looks like: it's based on the initial opening ceremony of 'shio harai' or 'salt purification,' which is done by priests before every performance. Kagura is a specialty of Shimane and Hiroshima Prefectures, where I've been living for the past six months. Please look up some videos on YouTube if you'd like to learn more.


	2. Reincarnation 10 4: Burnt

Author's notes: This is a follow-up to Reincarnation 3.5, but I feel like it came out so different it's a little hard to tell, haha... June in Japan really feels like this, by the way. And July, and August, and September...

* * *

Reincarnation 10.4: Burnt

By Akaitsuru RedCrane

The sun was finally starting to go down over a Tokyo sweltering in the grip of a June heat wave. Street noises, human voices, even the neon glow of the shop signs all seemed to acquire physical weight in the humidity, glomming together and sticking damply to the skin of anyone who ventured outside. The air was so thick that moving felt more like swimming in the dim crimson light; only the rasping shrieks of cicadas managed to cut through the sunset with any ease, and their noise was an oppressive reminder of the season. The thought of four more months of summer ahead circled over the city like a curse - the merciless weather had arrived swiftly, and hit with a tenacious vengeance. It wasn't supposed to let up until at least the beginning of October.

"I can't... believe... she made us... run... in this weather..."

Yoh Asakura's normally spiky hair had gone completely flat against his forehead, natural shape defeated by the sweat that was coating his entire body. His headphones hung limply from one hand as he forced himself to continue loping over the gritty sidewalk; it was so hot he couldn't bear to put them back around his neck where they belonged. When he had been getting dressed for evening training he had been sure Anna wouldn't demand the normal two hours of jogging on such a wretched day, but he had been wrong - as usual.

_ "Do you think you're going to be able to pick what weather you battle in when it's time for the Shaman Fight to start? You could have to engage in the middle of a desert for all you know, and your endurance has to be just as good there as it is anywhere else. Get out there and run! I expect you back at seven by the latest, so don't even think of trying to cheat by walking or you'll be doing penalty pushups!"_

((The girl is a demoness, if I may be so bold as to name her so, my lord,)) came a tiny voice from the vicinity of the boy's shoulder. It was the only part of Yoh that still felt cool, and as he tilted his head closer to hear the faint words a wonderful numbness spread over his cheek. ((Are you going to be alright exerting yourself like this?))

"We're... nearly... home now." The panting teenager glanced at his watch and gave a tremendous sigh, Anna's threats continuing to haunt him when he slowed to catch his breath. "I think we're only going to be half an hour late this time, too."

((Only thirty atonement push-ups? That is some small consolation, I suppose.)) The cold spot resting on Yoh's collarbone rolled across the back of his neck to his other shoulder, giving a strange kind of shiver when it paused. ((...Your body is improving, Yoh-dono.))

"You think I'm getting stronger? Haha, maybe these weeks of hell have been worth something then. Ever since Anna moved in I've been too tired to do anything except take orders and sleep - haven't noticed much else."

The pair jogged on in silence for a few minutes, the boy picking up his pace again as they followed the canal trail towards their house. A wisp of purple flickered in the corner of Yoh's vision, and the shaman glanced at his companion in the light reflecting off the water below. Amidamaru's hitodama form was the same color as the former samurai's pale hair, a distinct shade against the gold and red of the waning day. Lavender flames coiled and whipped themselves into a ball of brightness where he rested, but the fire was cold and left no trace of its passage on Yoh's clothes. Only the spirit guardian's eyes showed he was human when he took on this shape, and they were decidedly downcast as he huddled against his partner's neck.

((I wish she had at least let your wound finish healing before putting you on this regimen,)) the swordsman said broodingly, a tall patch of bamboo momentarily blocking out the harsh summer evening and letting his jewel-like glow be seen. A tendril of violet reached out and traced the bandaged gash where Tao Ren had skewered the shaman on his halberd. ((Even the strongest warrior can only take so much before his will begins to... dissolve...))

"Oh, well. Considering how many training manuals Anna's been reading, I would hope she'd know what she was doing." Yoh paused, and then smiled with a trace of his normal carefree energy, as though bracing up to reassure the ghost. "I'm fine though. Really. Don't worry about me."

((Sometimes it is not you I am concerned for...))

"Hm?"

Not sure he had heard correctly, Yoh started to ask what Amidamaru meant, but at that moment he crossed the threshold of the house's front gate and saw Anna standing on the porch. She did not look pleased, and that was more than enough to make him forget what he intended to say - in fact, if the shaman had had even an ounce of energy left after jogging five miles in the heat, he probably would have sprinted for cover. Amidamaru took the opportunity to slide across his master's ribs and fade into the memorial tablet at the boy's side, leaving Yoh to face his hellion of a fiancée alone. Pinioned by the blonde's icy stare, Yoh could only watch as she marched down the steps and hauled him inside without a word, inexorable as a tidal wave.

Yoh barely had time to shed his sandals and drop Amidamaru's ihai tablet on a couch before Anna impatiently dragged him out of the foyer. The long central hallway offered no escape and only emphasized Anna's murderous mood by amplifying her stomping footsteps on the wooden floor; stumbling along in her wake, the shaman boy realized they were heading toward dangerous territory and started to panic. When the itako pounded up the back stairs and tugged Yoh past his own room, he went cold all over: there was nowhere left to go except Anna's room.

"Noooooo, Anna, I'm not ready to do THAT with you yet, gimme a few more years at least -"

"What?! Oh, put a sock in it!"

She let go of him abruptly and Yoh collapsed in a cringing heap just inside the door, momentarily stunned. The austere bareness of the girl's quarters actually scared him more than if it had been filled with creepy stuffed animals or frilly decorations: there was nothing to hide behind, and her neatly folded futon dominated his view. But when he scrambled up to make a run for it Anna pulled an exasperated face and stepped on his foot, pointing to a stack of musty books and scrolls piled on her table - NOT to her bed, a fact that made Yoh's knees literally begin to quiver with relief.

"What exactly were you doing, going through my things? You know you're not allowed to come in here, let alone touch my stuff!"

"I, er..." Grasping the realization that Anna hadn't brought him here to forcibly molest him, Yoh straightened and gave his self-appointed future wife a quizzical stare. "W-What are you talking about? I've never even been in your room before now - even if I were curious, the 'keep out or die screaming' sign is more than enough reason to stay away."

"Nobody else corporeal lives here, so it had to be you." Twitching slightly at his continued confusion, the medium sighed. "I mean, I had these things in order, and now they're not. You're the only one physically capable of messing things up in this house, so I want an explanation, and I want it now!"

Subtle irritation began to dilute Yoh's fear, and he ambled over to the pile of material he was accused of riffling. Squinting in the dim light, he picked up the top-most scroll and carefully unrolled the crackling parchment to get a better look at the brushstrokes splashed over the surface.

"...Anna, I can't even read this."

"It's ancient Japanese calligraphy," the itako said in a huff, coming over to stand next to him. "Apparently your ancestors' handwriting wasn't any better than yours is now."

"My handwriting is much easier to read than this! Whatever. My point is there's no reason for me to bother with your antiques when I can't even read ancient Japanese."

"Then why did you come in here and ruin my organizational system in the first place?"

"That's what I'm saying, I didn't!"

"But this doesn't make any sense, then!"

Anna's eyes narrowed, but Yoh could tell her anger was turning into puzzled frustration. Apparently his honest bewilderment was convincing her he really didn't have a clue what this was all about. Bone-deep weariness competing with the growing hunger twisting his stomach, a desperate scheme came to the shaman boy and he seized the opportunity to distract her further.

"Uh, what are all these, anyway? You said something about the Asakuras...?"

"Hmph." Throwing herself down in a nearby chair, Anna started sifting through the mound, apparently reconstructing her lost arrangement. "They're rituals and shamanic lore that your grandmother lent to me when I decided to track you down. She didn't want me neglecting my studies while I was away. See? 'Eight Million-fold Prayers of Purification.' 'Notes on the Kagura dance.' 'Understanding _omikuji_.' 'Kukai's Thoughts on Divinity.' Things like that."

One battered book was teetering at the very edge of the table. Sensing his misdirection ruse was working, Yoh rescued the volume before Anna's impatient digging pushed it any further. Casually beginning to browse through the yellowed pages, he discovered something striking. The writing was still impossible to decipher, but...

"Hey, this one has pictures. What's it about?"

Anna paused long enough to give the cover a disinterested glance.

"'Discovery, care, and abilities of guardian spirits.' Haven't read it yet - I wonder if Kino-sensei threw that one in for you, I certainly don't need it."

"Heh, well, I don't either now, really." Yoh gave a flippant smile and, very slowly, started edging toward the hallway and freedom. "Anything I need to know about guardians I can learn from Amidamaru, haha..."

"I suppose." Though apparently engrossed in re-stacking her lesson material, Anna did finally focus on him with a sharp look when the shaman began to sidle out the door. "Yoh!"

Yoh winced. *Oh, I was _so_ close!*

"Yeah...?"

"Leave that book here. Just because I haven't read it doesn't mean it doesn't need to go into a pile." Anna seized the manuscript from him when he held it out, and then immediately reburied herself in her project. "Bring me some tea, would you? This could take a while."

The cicada cries of evening had been replaced with cricket song. Shadows stretched across the former Inn of Flames' tatami floors, cast by a moon riding high and full across the clear night sky; the silver glow was so dazzling, trickling in through the open window, that it turned the white of Yoh's bed sheets startlingly bright. After his confrontation with Anna, the young shaman had been only too happy to grab a hasty meal, rinse himself off in the shower, and then fall face-first into his futon. Asleep almost before he hit the pillow, it was no wonder the boy hadn't remembered to bring Amidamaru's memorial tablet up to his room.

At least, that was what Amidamaru tried to tell himself.

A radiance almost the same shade as the moonlight moved over the walls, Amidamaru's hitodama arising from the ihai to drift gloomily from room to room. The other ghosts of the place made way for him immediately, shrinking back and disappearing as swiftly as they could: by slaying their malevolent leader a few months back, the samurai had taught them to respect his sword, and they had learned the lesson well. The murdered family refused to meddle in his affairs unless explicitly ordered to do so, and consequently Amidamaru was the only person in the former inn who could demand privacy whenever he wished. He did so now, as he had many times before, using only a cold stare to exercise his will and send even the most recalcitrant ghosts scuttling back into the walls. The purple sphere hesitated in the den, large eyes pensive, and then the incorporeal flame wisped up through the beams of the ceiling like a curl of smoke.

((...Yoh-dono...))

Amidamaru emerged from the floor precisely where he had intended to: his master's moon-flooded chamber. The hitodama ball stretched liquidly for a moment, shifting and reforming without a sound; the tiny globe became a solid outline, a silhouette that cast no shadow even when it stood directly before the window. The figure seemed to sigh as it formed, and the opaque lavender shine gradually flaked away to reveal human features underneath - a flowing kimono robe, the glint of plated armor, and odd pale hair bound into a warrior's ponytail. The handsome face and body were filled with an aura of agile strength, but Amidamaru's expression held nothing but sadness as he sank down at the edge of Yoh's bed.

Outside, a passing breeze brushed against one of the house's wind chimes, and the faint shimmering noise elicited a muted groan from the boy. Nightfall hadn't eased the day's heat much, and the shaman had already thrown off his single thin blanket to expose as much skin as possible. While Amidamaru watched, Yoh tossed in his sleep and shifted to the other side of the mattress, searching for a cooler position. Boxers and the bandage around his shoulder were Yoh's only concession to modesty; his bare back had a faint sheen of sweat covering it, and the samurai bit his lip, forcing himself to momentarily look away from the teenager with eyes squeezed shut. The boy might seem to be lying before him, spread across the white coverlet like a scar-traced sacrifice, but to Amidamaru it felt like his partner was a thousand miles away: as distant as freedom, as unreachable as the past. Even as he gently smoothed a lock of hair away from his master's face, the ache of separation did not disappear.

The samurai reached up and slowly loosened the sash holding his robe closed. As the folds fell apart a faint breeze gusted fitfully in through the window, but it did not affect the ghost any more than the heat of the day had - the specter trembled slightly, trying to grasp a centuries-old memory of what summer wind felt like, but all he could conjure was a sense of loss. Yoh stretched happily in the soothing air, smiling at something in his dreams, his lithe form uncurling inches from Amidamaru's knees. A stab of pain radiated from over the ancient warrior's heart, and he put a hand to his breast, fingers sliding smoothly over faintly glowing outlines of bone and muscle. His own skin felt foreign under his palm; even when he touched himself there was no comfort in it, merely the impression of contact with something numb and cold. Only a shaman could truly bridge the gap between incorporeal death and tangible life, reach through the bars that kept spirits prisoner on another plane... Amidamaru looked down at where his hand was resting and winced, letting his arm fall.

A tracery of cracked violet color marred the phantom's chest, criss-crossing brutally like tiny whip marks over his ribs. The mass of nail-width lesions had spread to almost two inches since Amidamaru had last checked it; even as he examined them in the moonlight, they seemed to seethe malevolently and grow right before his eyes. It was hard to believe the black-edged stains had started as mere bumps before blossoming into their current form - they were so livid now that merely looking at them sapped the ghost's natural bravery. A sense of sick hopelessness surged in Amidamaru's throat like a sob, and he quickly pulled his kimono closed again. Every night he rebuilt the hope that the affliction would vanish as mysteriously as it had appeared, but something in him knew this to be impossible - perhaps the same part that feared the identity of the illness was not mysterious in the slightest.

*It has been a fortnight since my lips met yours in this very room, Yoh-dono.* The gentle radiance that always surrounded Amidamaru dimmed, casting his lean face in shadow. *A fortnight of uncertain hopes, crushed... of coming to your bedside, watching your slumber... a fortnight of finding that the corruption of my soul has boiled ever closer to the surface... I fear my time is running out, and I cannot even bring myself to say in reality the first words of what lurks in my heart.*

Yoh continued to smile where he lay, blissfully, infuriatingly unaware. The moonlight spilled silver across the nape of his neck, and the phantom's dark bruises writhed with exquisite agony as he stared. For an instant Amidamaru felt the devotion that always colored his perception of the shaman weaken, and a flash of unfamiliar resentment tore through him.

*After six hundred and twenty eight years of conflict and contemplation, to have a little boy hold my feelings hostage and prove me a coward...*

The world spun, blackened in his vision as the ghost abruptly pushed himself up and away from his partner's serene form. Even the very air suddenly felt claustrophobic, pressing in on him like a trap formed from his innermost thoughts. The pale samurai let his own flames consume his blighted human shape with a vengeance, hitodama flying through the neighboring wall almost as though he were being chased.

Next door in the depths of Anna's room, there was the muffled echo of ripping paper.

"There is definitely something weird going on here," the itako announced over the breakfast table, skewering a piece of grilled fish with particular malice and devouring it all in one bite. Yoh, half awake, flinched as his fiancee's chopsticks expertly prodded the mackerel on her plate, sympathy pains making him jump and twitch slightly in his own seat. He was almost used to the constant aching of his muscles by now, but something about Anna's jerky movements and piercing glances this morning had put him more on edge than exercising to exhaustion ever could. To cover his drowsy confusion he continued shoveling rice into his mouth as fast as possible, uncertain when she was going to demand he surrender his food and go out for the first exercises of the day.

"You didn't _hear_ anything last night?" Anna finally asked pointedly, nothing but bones left of her hapless meal. Yoh glanced at her, pretending to listen but really groping for the pot of green tea in the center of the table. "Something made a mess of my books again! They were all over the floor when I got up, but I swear they didn't make a sound when they fell..."

"I was really out of it," Yoh mumbled, finally zeroing in and snagging the teapot with obvious effort. "House could've fallen down and I wouldn't have noticed... mph. Maybe we had an earthquake?"

"An earthquake that didn't rattle anything but my room. Right." Anna eyed her fellow shaman with disdain, but thanks to slurping his bowl of miso Yoh completely missed the contempt on her face. "Hmph. Even you shouldn't have been able to sleep through whatever made the mess up there, trust me. Half the table looked like a typhoon hit it. The only thing I can think of is that we're developing some kind of poltergeist in here."

Yoh blinked at that, gulping down a floating flake of seaweed. "That can't be it. I would have noticed if something like that were in the house - _you_would have noticed, I'm sure." He closed his eyes briefly, a flicker of peaceful amusement moving over his face as it usually did when he stretched his shamanic senses. "Nothing's moving nearby but the usual energies..."

"Nothing on any of my planes either." Anna, by contrast, looked even more severe than usual when she exercised power, but even running her hands over her beads didn't tell her anything this time. "This is ridiculous. To normal people such things would be a supernatural mystery, but _I_ am not going to just let it rest at that."

Sipping slowly at his soup was doing wonders for Yoh's weariness, so he kept doing it while Anna restlessly picked at what was left on her plate.

"I already asked the house spirits!" the girl finally spat, just as if he'd asked her a question. "I had them under questioning long before I woke you up."

*Before five in the morning? Ugh. Well, they say evil never sleeps.* Setting down his empty dish with a sigh, Yoh finally felt ready to look directly at his unwanted roommate. "Is there something you want me to do about this, Anna?"

"Well I'm largely out of ideas at the moment," she sniffed. "I can't exorcise things unless I know something about their nature. Hmm... Call that lackey of yours, maybe he can make himself useful for once."

"What did you say?" Appalled, Yoh actually dared a glare at his current source of misery. "Don't talk about Amidamaru like that, especially when you want his help!"

"Oh get real, Yoh. Praise him all you like, but I'm starting to wonder if that 600-year-old wuss is really the right ghost for you to bring to the Shaman Fight." Coolly ignoring his agitation, Anna started gathering up the breakfast things. "A proper guardian would have already chased out whatever's doing this, or at least have figured out what's going on. Your samurai hardly seems to stir himself out of that ihai these days - and human ghosts aren't exactly the best allies - "

"The Shaman Fight can take a flying leap if I'm not going through it with Amidamaru," the boy said flatly. "You don't know what he's really like. We did everything together before you came - it's thanks to you he's been making himself scarce. It seems like we haven't had a real conversation in ages, come to think of it..."

"That's my fault how, exactly?" Anna asked the question rhetorically, china balanced with perfect precision as she headed toward the kitchen.

"You started picking on him the moment you met him! What else could it be?"

Noticing he was already talking to the itako's retreating footsteps, Yoh reached protectively for where his guardian's ihai usually rested against his ribs. His hand came back empty, and an abrupt jolt of shock and fear shot up Yoh's spine - how could he have forgotten to belt it on this morning, when it lived on his bedside table? He looked frantically around the room for several seconds, thinking he had just misplaced it in his earlier hunger, but the search under furniture and seating cushions only turned up dust bunnies. Mentally playing back his hazy journey out of bed, the teenager was startled to realize that he hadn't actually seen Amidamaru at all since yesterday afternoon. Usually the hitodama at least gave him a polite greeting on the way to brush his teeth, sometimes even whispered encouragement from the hollow behind his ear when he had trouble getting up... With a swamping surge of guilt the shaman recalled exactly where he had left the memorial tablet and scrambled up from the table, knocking one knee hard against the sturdy wood in the process.

Amidamaru's resting place was right where Yoh had tossed it, tilted slightly sideways against the arm of the couch - a rather disrespectful angle, the boy scolded himself, hastily picking up the smooth black stone and running soothing fingers over it. His ghost's presence radiated from the relic as strongly as ever, but it quailed from his touch a little, quivering under the surface of the slate in a way Yoh had never noticed before. The shaman's lips drew together nervously and he lifted the tablet to his face, trying to figure out what the matter was.

The golden characters marking out Amidamaru's name shimmered at him from the front of the ihai; was it just his imagination, or did they seem duller than usual, the brushstrokes infinitesimally skewed...? He had painted his guardian's name on the stone himself, but bad handwriting or not he wasn't such a poor calligrapher to do the strokes _backwards_ the way they looked just now... As the shaman tilted the stone into a shaft of dusty morning light the kanji appeared to shift position, oily color distorting them only to vanish. The hair on the back of Yoh's neck started to lift, a feeling like static dancing up his spine: the sensation of being watched.

"Are you quite finished? If you're not going to summon him, it's time to start training!"

Anna grabbed his collar so unexpectedly Yoh fumbled and nearly dropped the ihai altogether. It was all he could do to flip it back onto the couch before the itako started dragging him off toward the back yard, his protests falling on deaf - or at least unsympathetic - ears.

In startling contrast to the previous day, the weather was cool and shining when the two teenagers stepped outside. The dawn sun struck Yoh square in the face at first and nearly made him stagger off the veranda, but as his vision adjusted his mood gradually started to lift as well: the unfolding morning was so radiant, so perfect, his natural love of the world could not help but notice and respond. Dew dripped in the long grass, a soft wind played over the boy's cheek, and birds strung chains of gorgeous song from tree to tree. Steam rippled off the surface of the hot springs and made curling patterns against the garden stones, shadow and vapor entwining in eternal illusion. The utterly clear blue sky overhead gave notice that by ten o'clock yesterday's misery would repeat itself, but for now it was as though everything was waking, smiling, and feeling happy to be alive. Even Anna seemed moved by the sight, uncharacteristically silent as they walked through the yard and into the rustling shade of a bamboo forest behind the ryokan.

"I changed things up while you were jogging yesterday, so keep your eyes open," the itako finally said, coming to a stop in the midst of a small clearing. Yoh looked around apprehensively, even as he automatically fell to stretching his legs: this wasn't where the obstacle course usually started. "Part of the challenge this time is finding the new route, but I've put out markers you should be able to use."

"That really seems like something I could use a spirit ally for," Yoh sighed, a severe twinge of anxiety reawakening his earlier uneasiness. He wasn't really _sure_ there was anything the matter, but... "I mean -"

"Just see if you can do it." The itako's tone was surprisingly reasonable, mirroring her calm expression even as she cut him off. "You might be able to, you know, if you even tried."

"I just -"

"Are you saying that you can't do this alone?"

"I'm not saying _anything_ -"

"Good, because that's the whole point of this. I've only just gotten here and I can already tell you lean on Amidamaru so much you doubt your own abilities." The girl's eyes narrowed, cluing Yoh in to the fact that he had just walked into a trap. "You can't do that kind of thing in the Shaman Fight, period. You can't doubt. You can't rely on anyone but yourself in the end. Regardless of how you feel about them, you shouldn't even _think_ you're powerless without a ghost to help you. I won't let your trust limit what you're really capable of."

Speech finished, Anna sat down on a discretely placed lawn chair, crossed her legs, and clicked the stopwatch hanging around her neck with an attitude of finality. Yoh stared at her for a few seconds, surprise, anger, and sheer astonishment cycling across his face - *how could she even think such things, let alone say them?* - and then he sprinted off in a shower of fallen leaves. Arguing with Anna really was about as useful as arguing with the steadily advancing numbers on her clock, in the end, and standing there wasting his breath was only going to earn him penalty pushups. The sooner he was done with the itako, the sooner he could check on the person who really mattered.

Up in Anna's suite, a single book waveringly rose from the surface of the work table. It hovered, shuddering in midair, as the rest of the collection was suddenly and violently swept aside as if by an impatient arm. The scrolls and manuscripts fluttered off the table but made no noise, most of them coming to rest with abnormal slowness all over the floor - the one airborne volume hesitated an instant longer and then dropped like a stone, falling open to a well-worn page. Purple fingerprints appeared on the parchment like bruises, smearing the illustrations with darkness.

*It's... there!*

The little shikigami that had been beckoning Yoh waved one last time as he tore past, the apparition's luminous body melting back into the bushes leaving only a glittering bead behind. Apparently Yohmei had been teaching Anna some of his tricks, since most of the "markers" Anna had put out were actually the tiny spirits Yoh's grandfather was so fond of - spirits that were skilled at hiding, dodging and generally making it a challenge to find the right route through the undergrowth. Even as he found one, his sixth sense was already straining to locate the next; his flying feet were an afterthought, his mind leading him easily around the pitfalls and tripwires Anna had spread so liberally through the forest. Once he had gotten the hang of it, this version of the obstacle course seemed almost easy... his newfound physical strength was working in harmony with his other abilities, just as his trainer had intended.

He had one moment of panic near the end, when he lost the trail to a bead-spirit strung high above the trail. But even that puzzle unraveled when Yoh remembered the way Amidamaru lifted into the sky to find pathways through the city for him. He couldn't achieve the same effect himself, but just the mental change in perspective gave him enough direction to figure it out. As the shaman dashed off again through the greenery he realized it was the first time since the start of the run he had thought of the ghost - the pang he felt this time had a bit of shame in it, and his pace slowed infinitesimally.

*I should have stayed and made sure he was okay.*

He nimbly twisted and dodged around the towering fronds of the forest, moving automatically with the rhythm of his jog.

*I owe him so much... even my life... shouldn't he always come first?*

A shikigami skittered between the boy's feet, and he swerved to follow in its wake without even looking twice.

*But what if... Anna's right?*

The marker-sprite bounced nimbly over a clump of fallen bamboo and disappeared. Yoh placed his foot carefully and used the natural springiness of the stalks to launch himself up and over in pursuit; his injured shoulder protested faintly, but he barely noticed it as his leap catapulted him into the air.

*Could it be that Amidamaru's strength... has just been sheltering my weakness up until now?*

That was the last thought he put together before plummeting into the trench on the other side of the barrier. The rope he had been meant to catch swayed languidly in the breeze, bead-spirit clinging to it and laughing.

The violet on the pages was spreading slowly, like a bloodstain, like a fire. It oozed up from the fingerprints smearing the parchment, dripped over the book's battered cover, ran into the cracks on the table and began to pool. The welling was gradual, but steady, unstoppable. Covering the tabletop, the color had the sick, glossy look of a deep hole torn in reality. Across the room, as if in response to an undetectable heat, the paper in the shoji doors started to blacken, curling back in painfully twisted shreds of ash. The walls blistered; the plaster of the ceiling abruptly cracked into spiderweb patterns and began to flake away. Shuddering tremors rippled through the entire house, but the spasms were silent... at first.

"Do you hear that?"

Yoh, clinging to a greased wooden pole for dear life, was shocked to discover that Anna's whip was no longer cracking over his head for the first time in hours.

"Hear what?" He slipped a few inches toward the shadowy, snake-filled pit below and had to pause long enough to get a better hold; his shoulder, truly aching by now, protested this instance of self-preservation. "...I don't hear anything, Anna."

"That's just it. The birds have stopped singing."

Fingernails and shoe heels dug into the slippery wood, Yoh only had to concentrate for an instant before realizing his housemate was right. Not even the cicadas were calling, their whirring shrieks' absence highlighting the unnatural hush. Glancing nervously below, the shaman saw with alarm that the venomous vipers Anna had collected to "motivate" him through this climbing exercise were all balled up in one corner of the moat, motionless. Even when he slid carefully down into the hole, the snakes just looked at him and refused to budge - their yellow eyes were hooded, usually flickering tongues still, like they were all paralyzed. Anna gave him a hand out of the shoulder-height ditch, too obviously troubled to care that he was covered in oil from the pole. Even the wind gradually died away, withering as if it were afraid to stir.

"What's going on?" Anna's voice was a whisper.

"I don't know..."

The two shamans stood huddled together as the afternoon ground to a stop around them, both taunt and straining for some hint at what was happening. Yoh made a faint gasp and suddenly clapped both hands to his head, doubling over as though someone had punched him - Anna turned, automatically reaching to steady the boy, but in the same instant there was an enormous crash from the house that almost deafened her. Half of the east wall bowed outward and then burst in a shower of splinters and glass, masonry being propelled with such force it ripped the limbs off the nearest trees and thudded into the lawn like stone rain. Pragmatic even in the midst of shock, Anna knocked Yoh to the ground and then threw herself on top of him, barely flinching as a fist-sized chunk of concrete hit her in the thigh. She lifted her head and just made out a massive figure standing in the destruction, its features completely shrouded in a swirling cloud of plaster dust.

((NEVER,)) it hissed, the word echoing huge but at the same time quiet, almost intimate somehow. ((NEVER, NEVER...))

The thing had no aura, not a flicker of ghostly presence revealing its nature to the itako's spiritual senses. Yoh moaned underneath her and Anna hugged him unashamedly, suddenly understanding why normal humans feared the supernatural so much. By the time she mustered the nerve to look up again, the shadow was gone. Its passage was marked only by the feeling of mourning hanging in the air, and the fluttering of tattered parchment, scraps floating like snow from Anna's gutted room.

* * *

End notes: Working on the sequel now, which should be the final chapter.


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